thurdl sports

WBC: And the road ends for Team USA

There were some odd ways in which we could lose tonight's game and still advance, but none of them came to fruition. We just flat out lost what was a rather sad showing to a Mexican team hungrier for a moral victory than we gave them credit for. Our last hit came in the 5th inning, and we were ultimately eliminated on a double play, just to add that last little screw.

Semifinals are set. Korea/Japan and Dominican/Cuba. Korea has beaten the Japanese twice, and the DR won its only meeting so far against Cuba. My pick right now is for Korea to actually win the whole shebang, which will be interesting, because they were not one of the big pretournament favorites.

I'll do a rundown of the stats for all the Nats through two rounds tomorrow. Right now, the only National still playing is Soriano. With Mexico and the US eliminated, we'll be getting back three of our better relievers, and Schneider. Hopefully they'll infuse some life into a Nationals team that's been just limping through a pathetic Spring Training. Though I'm worried our problems are much bigger than anything they can solve.

Oh, and Ayala looked like he hurt himself pitching in relief for the Mexicans. So not only did they eliminate the US, but might have taken out one of the Nats better relievers in the process. Oh joy of joy.

In happier news, the showdown with Soriano has been postponed at least two more days with the Dominicans advancing. Of course, if that's the up side, things are pretty grim right now.

posted by thurdl @ 10:49 PM